THE BEE IX G EIYEE COAL FIELD 



419 



/ff»!' 40' 



thorough knowledge of the coast has been obtained the difficulties of 

 securing suitable harbors will not be insurmountable. 



The Copper River and Northwestern Railway Company, which has 

 a railroad running northward into the interior from the splendid 

 harbor of Cordova, has surveyed a branch line from this road to Ka- 

 talla and thence to the coal field. The distance from the coal field to 

 Cordova by this route is about 90 miles. Another route has been sur- 

 veyed from the main line to the coal field by way of Charlotte Lake. 

 By this route the distance to Cordova is only about 60 miles. 



The area within which coal has been found extends in a southwest- 

 northeast direction from Bering Lake to beyond Slope glacier, a dis- 

 tance of more than twenty miles. The width of the known coal forma- 

 tion is, in the northeastern part of the area, more than five miles, but 

 the average of the field is considerably less. 



The chief areas applied for in this field include the following: 

 Controller Bay group, Pittsburgh group, Youngstown group, Cleve- 

 land group, Rathbone and Aurora groups. Pacific Coal and Oil Com- 

 pany group or English Company group, Cunningham group, Chezum 

 group, Wardell group, Hartline group, Alaska Petroleum and Coal 

 Company group, \Tilloughby group, the claims of the Portland Alaska 



